and researchers, including Professor
David McNeil, who met Waterman
to find out if there was still any
kind of automatic process that was
enabling him to use gestures again.
McNeil asked Waterman to watch
a cartoon and later asked him to
describe it. During his description
Waterman used gestures to signal
some of the events in the cartoon.
After studying the video recording
of this description McNeil pointed
out that Waterman had an incredibly well honed synchronization
between his hand actions and his
speech, with both being presented
simultaneously. This would seem to
suggest that gesture is an instinctive part of language, controlled by
a part of the brain separate to that
of movement. To prove this McNeil
then asked Waterman to report the
events of the cartoon again, but
this time without being able to see
his body. If McNeil was right and
gesture is controlled by a different
area of the brain to movement then
Waterman should still be able to
present a synchronized description
using speech and gesture, regardless
of the fact he cannot see his hands.
Sure enough, Waterman’s timing
of gesture was still there, backing
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McNeil’s theory. But without seeing
his hands his movements became
imprecise. Waterman’s visualizing
the gesture in his head helps him
express himself better, although not
perfectly. In gesture it seems that
there is a link between visualization
and movement, which helps link
our speech and our gestures, which
contributes to how Waterman has
recaptured his use of them.